Grandparents: Boundaries, Parenting Differences and Advice

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Welcome back to the No One Told Us podcast, I'm your host Rachel and today is a very special day, a very special episode because I have my parents, my mom and dad Diane and John here today and they're going to answer a lot of our burning questions about their generation and about being grandparents and how things have changed from the time that we were babies back in the late 80s, early 90s and today. So thanks for doing this with me guys.
You're welcome.
Anytime.
They're at my sister's house right now and she has two dogs. So if anybody hears any like whining, that is what that is.
It's not us.
It's not them. So, okay. I have had mom on the Instagram before and people love her, but today is dad's big debut, speaking to my audience. Is there anything that you wanna say before we kind of just... dive into questions? -
Other than the fact that we're your greatest fans.

Thank you.
No, I don't think so. My assistant, Corey, just had a baby yesterday. I don't know if you found out somehow, but she's a follower of yours.
Oh, yay.
Yeah, and one of the things she said, which I think is really right, which is really true, and I think probably the reason why you're resonating with people is that she said, you know, what I love about it is that whatever it's sort of like whatever you do, it's okay. And that's the way Rachel, people feel. And I think that's right. And I think that, you know, we'll probably get into it a little bit later. But I think it's really right that, because we're going to start talking about how it was for us. And what did we know? What did we learn? What were we trying to find out about raising children, and it was always like somebody was telling you, this is the wrong way, this is the right way. And you spent half the time screwing it up, and you spent half the time trying to figure out what the right way was, or doing stuff that people said was the right way and having it be the wrong way. You know what I mean? In your own head, you were like, this isn't right, and Mom could talk about it a little bit later too about letting babies cry and all that kind of stuff, but... But I really appreciated what Cori said about you, where she was just saying, she just makes you feel like whatever you do, it's not wrong, and try to guide yourself that way and do it with some instinct and do it with some love and it would be right somehow. So that was just something I would start out with.
Shout out to Cori and welcome to your baby. That's so sweet. For our generation too, I mean, for you guys, it was a little different just because of where you were hearing the information, but I think today there is still a lot of like, this is the right way, this is the wrong way, and we have social media and we have like all these experts that are trying to tell us like that there's one best way. There's a lot of like scientific type of parenting now with different books coming out saying these are scientifically the ways that are the best ways to do everything. And I think that can be really overwhelming. Where did you guys get most of your information about how to raise babies when we were born?
Well, as I told you before, I mean, my mom had already passed. And so I didn't have really anyone to go to. So I did a lot of it by instinct, but I also did a lot of it by Dr. Fode, your pediatrician. I'd call call him or the staff was really good. But Dad and I, I don't know how many times we'd go to the library or a bookstore and buy self -help books. I mean, but I also, like Dr. Brazelton was a huge influence back in the day, back in the 80s and 90s, and he was a really instrumental part of how tried to raise you kids. He was really the one that also
His stuff is great.
His stuff is great. Yeah. He was very much a role model. He was very, like, you talk about gentle parenting now. I feel like that's what he was really encouraging was, you know, kids need discipline in the sense of they need to know, you know, right from wrong, you know, you don't touch a stove You know, you know safety issues things like that, but he also was very much into listening and letting your children have a voice But have boundaries as well.

Yeah.
Yeah, we went to we actually went to see him one time To hear him speak we were so like impressed by him.
Really?
And one of the things that, yeah, and one of the things that he was really into, and I think it did usher in the kind of gentle parenting thing was one of his main things was that babies are rational beings. Babies don't just scream and cry willy -nilly with nothing behind it. They're doing it for a reason. And babies have an agenda and they're actually like thought processing what they're doing.
They have a need.
And we didn't think that until, you know, we learned that and child rearing and child, you know, raising kids before that was the whole thing of like, your baby's an irrational beast and you have to train it somehow, become a little miniature adult as quickly as you can. And Dr. Brazelton would say, no, it's like, we don't care about toilet training at a certain time. It's just like, get it done eventually. You don't need to get it done now. And that listening to the baby and treating the baby as a rational being was the way to proceed. And we had never heard that before that. The parenting books and child rearing books or whatever media we had before that, never said that.
I love that. And I didn't know that you guys want to hear him speak. Did you know that I, um, so I just started this fellowship as you guys know, and we spent like the whole weekend last weekend talking about him and his like touch points and stuff. So that's cool that you saw him speak. I didn't know that.
No, is he still relevant.
He's still very relevant.
Oh, he's still pretty relevant. Yeah.
And like the, uh, child development and like attachment world, I mean, I'm sure there. are critics of them like there are of anybody. But yeah. So okay, so you would go to like books and use Dr. Brasleton and the pediatrician. I know lots of people still get a lot of their, you know, parenting and advice from pediatricians. So then you were hearing this information that was resonating with you. And then so how did you take in the information from my pediatrician who told you to let me cry it out when I was a baby like did that seemed to Like contradict what you guys felt like you knew or wanted to do or were you just desperate because I was like a difficult baby? How did that all go?
You weren't a difficult baby. You just you know everything back then if you cried a lot or did a lot of things like Everything was put on She must be a colicky baby. Everything was colic. And then you'd be told, go out and get the colic drops. And, you know, and then that wouldn't help. And it was something in my breast milk. And so I had to go on, you know, all these different, you know, restrictions for my own diet, because everything was affecting you. And, you know, and some of that obviously could have been true. But some of it could have just been your temperament. And I don't know. I really don't know why the crying was so strong with you. But you know, it could have been that you just had a sensitive stomach as we know even today.
Yeah.
Well, the thing of it was too that we regarded the information that we got from the pediatrician like it was the gospel, whatever he told us to do, we did it. But I do remember at a certain point in time, we didn't agree with it. I remember specifically with you, I came home from work one day and mom was sitting on the floor outside your room and you were in the crib screaming your head off. But mom was crying too. And I was like, okay, I should go back to work, you know. And she was like, I don't agree with this. And I said, what do you mean? And she goes, she's been in there crying and Dr. Foti just told me to let her cry, let her cry. And she said, I just don't think it's right. And I think it kind of marries together somehow with what you're doing, which is that, you know, doctor's not always right, crying isn't always right. Maybe my parental instinct is that I should go in there and console this baby who's crying for a reason of some kind, and solving the problem was super difficult, but just sitting there and letting the baby cry, mom knew that it wasn't the right thing, and just something was telling her this isn't right.
Yeah.
And afterward, after we decided as a couple not to do that anymore, we started bringing you into our room and put you in the bassinet. And it almost, I can't recall now, it's been so long but I feel like it was absolutely the change. Like it just changed.
To have me close, yeah.
Yes, it just, and I was responsive to you. And so it seemed like all of a sudden you weren't as colicky and you weren't as crying as often because I was, it was because I was consoling you that you weren’t crying.
Right.
It doesn't make sense not to console a baby who's crying and then you're upset that it's crying.
I know. I know.
And you know, we have to realize like in in New England in the 1990s and early 2000s, some of this stuff was stuff you weren't supposed to do. Like you wouldn't admit to your friends that like your kid Was sleeping in your bed with you for example or was sleeping even in your room because these were there were yardsticks You were supposed to meet and the good parents didn't have those. They didn't do that stuff, like your baby was out of diapers at a certain point in time or you were a bad parent. Your baby was not breastfeeding after a certain time or you're a lousy parent. or your kid was not sleep You know was sleeping the whole night in their own bed and not getting up. Otherwise, they were like a considerative behavior problem where you had some kind of like psychological problem with your kid because they were doing this stuff that wasn't meeting the yardsticks.And it was a shameful thing for the parents. You would never tell your friends, like, my kid sleeps in my bed with me or anything like that.
Yeah, but do you feel like a lot of your friends and people that you knew probably were having those issues and just nobody talked about it?
it?
Nobody talked about it.
Nobody would admit to it. No one. I mean, I had probably my best friend while we were raising kids was a woman by the name of Mary and she had kids of same ages and her and I would go back and forth. And we probably were the only ones that would really say to each other like, Oh, I brought the baby in the bed last night. And she'd be like, Oh, you do too. You know, but it was like, you wouldn't tell your like, she had parents. Yeah, would never have told her mother that she did that. Because she would get chastised. I mean, it was like a big secret. And, um, yeah, you just wouldn't do that.
And grandpa lived with us. So my mom's dad lived with us until he passed away when I was in eighth grade So he was kind of there with you guys. Yeah, so he was there with you guys while we were Babies obviously and growing up. He was in the same house. Did he ever share his opinions with you or did you ever ask his advice?
Well, it's funny you say that because He was one of these people that knew his boundary and so he wouldn't say a lot or put his two cents in. However, when we were going through the sleep training, there were a couple of times during the day where I'd be really upset, as Dad said, with you crying or your sisters. It was more you. And he would say, "Why are you letting the baby cry? "Just go in the room and pick up the baby." So even with him coming from his generation, it was like he didn't understand why I wouldn't do it either. And he would think that he thought it was really wrong of me not to go in. And that was his generation where you would think he wouldn't have that attitude, but he did. And you know, and it wasn't long after that that dad had come home and found me, you know, crying about it.
Yeah.
So I think I was getting his influence, dad's influence to make me feel like I'm not crazy in feeling like this is wrong and that I don't wanna do this. 'Cause now the two most important men in my life, my father and my husband, were telling me that it was okay that I didn't feel comfortable with this.
Yeah. Yeah.
But Grandpa, you know, the thing you got to remember about Grandpa was that as far as the kids were concerned, he was just the sweetest, nicest guy in the world. I know.
Yeah. He was a softie with us.
I'd go in the room and I'd see. Yeah. He would just do everything for you guys. Like I'd go in the room and you'd be sitting in his lap with a bowl of like whipped cream, just eat him, you know, or some kind of like. a pile of cookies in your lap or something like that. So, you know, he was just the sweetest, nicest guy to you guys. And he was not a disciplined guy at all. And it came to that. Yeah, even though he was a disciplined guy, his own kids.
Well, I was going to say, like, grandparents tend to be a little more lenient with their grandkids. So I wonder if he would have approached it with the, in the same way with you guys when you were kids mom, as he would think you should approach it with us. Um, We're going to take a quick break and we'll be right back with some questions from my audience.
Okay, we're back and we have some questions that I gathered from my Hey Sleepy Baby audience that they want to know. So the first one is I recently posted a TikTok trying to give some helpful advice to the boomer generation about how to have effective boundaries with their children and their in laws and their, and their grandchildren. And it was not well received at all by the Boomer generation. They were very offended about these boundaries. And perhaps it was my delivery. I, as you guys know, probably better than anybody, I can be a little bit snarky.
Yeah, but I thought that I thought that my points were valid, so people are wanting to know what your thoughts are about our generation kind of being "obsessed with boundaries," and do you think it's too much or do you think it's all in the best interest of the kids? Where do you guys stand on that stuff?
I did think it was a little snarky. Because I was always used to telling you what to do. And I felt like you were telling me what to do. But that's okay. I mean, you're the expert.
But no, the thing was, is like, I was not talking to you guys, and I was not talking to my in laws, because like, all of the comments were like, Oh, my God, I'm so glad you're not my daughter. Like, Oh, my God, I would kill myself if my son married someone like you. And I was like, I obviously would not be on the internet if I was talking about my own parents or my in-laws. I was speaking on behalf of my generation because of the things that I hear all the time. I hear these crazy stories from people who have these insane interactions with their mother -in -law or their mom or whatever about them just really not respecting the way that they're parenting.
Right. I thought some of it was pretty basic and straightforward, like asking about the bottle feeding versus the breastfeeding and all that kind of stuff. That was pretty easy, I thought. But then there was one that kind of made me think a little bit more. And it was something I had never thought about when you were saying ask permission to touch the kids or hug the kids or whatever. It was like, you know, when Rachael, when Noe and Otto and Leni are at the house, we don't really do that. I mean, and I thought that seemed a little frankly overboard to me. Like, am I gonna have to ask Noe if she wants a hug every time I wanna hug her? I'm not doing that. So that was kind of my reaction.
That was one that a lot that was one that a lot of people had a problem with and someone responded saying something like I'm going to hug them no matter what even if they run away from me like I'm their grandma that's my right and that's a little bit cringe.
Well I think your point wasn't that I mean the way I read it was your point wasn't that we couldn't we had to add them every minute of every day of every hour that we wanted to touch them or snuggle with them. I think your point was if they say no, or if you say, oh, come and give me a hug. And they say no, that we're not supposed to go and hug them. And I kind of understand that part of it because I don't think I would, you know,, I don't want to force myself on my grandkids. But we haven't had that experience where they flat out saying no. That they don't want to snuggle or I guess we have I guess there have been times when I really stop and think about it where I'll say come and snuggle and you know one of them will be like no,
I want to stay here. Well, I think we never force it.
To me to me What was constructive? constructive about it, what was good was that teaching the personal boundary thing at a very young age. And like, so I don't have to wait till my kid is 16 before she gets some like super uncomfortable situation with someone from the opposite sex or gets abused by somebody because they didn't know how to establish the personal boundary. You're saying the part that I loved about it. I mean, I didn't really like the whole thing of like, I have to ask permission. That didn't resonate with me. I didn't agree with that part.
Because you don't want to have to ask.
But the other part of it, the other part which is teaching the kid to establish the boundary at two, three, whatever, so that they have that through their life and they don't get into those situations with people that could be doing abusive things to them was great.
Yeah, but it's also, it's not even just about... Really, really. yeah, and it's not even just about the future. And when they're 16, it's about right now, like most kids that are abused in childhood are abused by a family member, someone that they know. So it's really, it's not about the grandparents and hurting their feelings. It's about, we need to do this to make sure that our kids know that they can always say no, and that that will be respected. And if it's not,
then that's a warning sign to them.
I agree. And I think that the majority of people out there that are grandparents are like us, where they're thrilled to see their grandkids, the grandkids are thrilled to see them. It doesn't have to be a situation where every time I move, I have to ask to touch them or whatever, because there's no risk here. However, I understood what you meant by it. And I thought that... you know, I thought that in the bigger scheme of what you were saying, you were saying the right thing.
Thanks.
I think it just hit the grandparents that are like us.
Well, and a lot of people, a lot of people said, like, we feel like we have to walk on eggshells, we can't say anything to you guys anymore. And I can understand that point of view for sure. I think. Yeah. I think what we are. trying to say, and I'll just speak for millennial parents, is that we already get so much like we're inundated with information and opinions about how to raise kids and it's very overwhelming. And so really, I think what we want from parents and from in -laws is just support and not constantly questioning, oh, you're still breastfeeding, oh, they're still not potty -trained, oh. Oh, you're not going to do this this way. Oh, you're not going to do this the way I did it when you were little. I think it's just those comments that that make people feel really like defensive and judged instead of just supported and sleep and feeding as I have learned are two very sensitive subjects that people feel really like can feel a lot of shame around. And I think they just don't want to be questioned about it.
Is it the questioning or is it that we shouldn't ask it all?
Well, I think it depends. I think it depends on your relationship, honestly. Like if you asked me about when I'm gonna stop breastfeeding Leni, I wouldn't take that as like a personal offense. I would take that as like you just wondering. And the same thing with my mother -in -law, because I have good relationships with you and with my mother -in -law. So I think, yeah, I think it really just depends on the person and the dynamic. But all right, next question.
Someone wanted to know if I would the easiest baby so I'm one of three girls I'm the oldest and was I the easiest baby…. I'm gonna guess that I was not ….you were three three out of three but that's not bad. No your sister Natalie was these yeah Natalie was the easiest baby my last one and it could be because by then I knew what I was doing and was way more confident in what I was doing doing and yeah I didn't do any of the cry it out with her you know so I think that by the time, Lauren even Lauren had it harder because I was still you know figuring it out, but by your third one you're so much more relaxed and I know parenting.
I say that all the time so I think that Lenny is our easiest baby and we don't really know if that's actually true or if we just are like better parents now and just get it now more.
Okay, someone is asking a question about how to approach their mother -in -law. She says, this is from Hayley. She says, "How can I kindly ask my mother -in -law to calm down? She thinks everything is a hazard."
Wow, that's interesting. That's an interesting perspective of it not being the parent who thinks everything's a hazard. I think it gets back to the same thing you were talking about before. You guys have more access to more information about, for example, how to make a house baby proof or whatever, I mean, than we ever did. The access to the information is there. I'm sure that this woman is doing everything she can to make sure their baby or kids are safe.

it's just goes back to what you're the tick -tock you have to establish yourself and say like I'm gonna say this now and the roles reversed I'm gonna tell you the parent that you can't tell me this stuff or I've got it covered or I've Access to the information and I looked at it and I'm and I know what's up.
I also think that there's a way to talk to your mother -in -law or a parent in a way where they don't feel like they're being excluded. I think the problem is that when someone comes to you and feels like they're trying to give you the knowledge that they knew from years ago and it's not received as an open conversation, then they get their back up because they feel like they're being excluded out of their grandchild's life in all aspects. So I also think that if there's a way that she could say something that would be like, oh, I understand what you're saying and I'll think about that. It doesn't always have to be a yes or a no. It would pacify maybe the mother -in -law to feel like she's taking in the information. It doesn't mean she has to do whatever the mother -in -law is doing, but just to make the mother -in -law feel like she's at least listening to her and not just cutting her off might go a long way.
Yeah. I
don't really agree. I think the mother -in -law needs a harder push. Being a female, that's what I think. I think that being a mother -in -law is a very difficult position to be in especially if it's you know It's not your daughter. It's your son's Baby, and they're not looked at quite the same way, which is already hard for them. You have to be a little sensitive to the mother -in -law, too. That's all.
Okay Diane sticking up for all those mother -in -laws Okay, somebody else asked a similar question, but I think you kind of touched on it just how to approach grandparents when we want things done a certain way. And I think to just like summarize what you both say, it's like, it's okay to be direct and to say, this is what I've decided, like, thanks so much. I'll look into what you said. Or I always tell parents to like, if it's your in -laws you're dealing with, like make your partner be the one to say it.
That's a good point. If Marley ever had a problem with the way you guys were interacting with our kids, he would talk to me about it and I would come to you or vice versa. So I also, I think it's not fair for, you know, daughter -in -law and mother -in -law to constantly be pitted against each other. I think the partnership is definitely at a certain point.
What have you learned from my content that you wish you had done when we were little?
Oh, I can tell you right now the main main thing for me is and I always want to talk to you about this so this is a good point to bring it up but is to have had a more substantial way of listening to you kids versus being the parent and the kid…..and feeling like everything had to be a lesson. Yeah. And just letting you have more of a voice. And you know, the whole time out and go to your room and you know, don't come out until whenever, I if I could do one thing different, it would be that I would never have sent you to your room. I would never have put you in time out. I would have sat down like you do with the kids and I would have said, talk to me.
Yeah. And that's my biggest regret.
Yeah, because we see you guys doing that. We see you and Marley doing that. And at first it was kind of like, what the heck are they doing? Like, you're the authoritarian, you're the parent, you're the authority. Put down the law, tell that kid what to do and make them do it. And then we learned after just watching like, okay This looks a little weird, but then after that we're like, you know, that's not so weird anymore. Now they're giving the kid the opportunity to state their position or give their opinion or say how they feel. When we when we were raising kids, it was like you weren't that's not what you were doing. Yeah, you just didn't it was do this do that it was you know behavior We're trying to direct and guide behavior. We didn't ask you how you felt about it
Yeah, yeah, we didn't say like you've been in your room for two weeks now. How do you feel about it? You know what I mean? We just put you in there and that was it.
Yeah, Well after a couple days., I used to get grounded a lot.
Your original stated grounding was a week or two weeks But after a couple days we let you we usually let you come out because we felt sorry for you about yeah I mean we didn't think about what you thought or how you felt.
Yeah.
And it also goes back to what you said about fear, you know, you know, there was a sense of fear for you in the sense of, oh, I'm going to be really punished or I'm going to, and not, not to say that children shouldn't have a sense of trepidation when things they're going to do or then they know that are wrong, there should be some sense of, oh, there's going to be a consequence. I think they're, I still believe consequences are vital in raising children and, um, but I think just letting the kids know that they can come to you with anything and willing to talk to them is huge. To me, that was, that's the biggest thing in your content. that I take away.
We're going to take a quick break.
So yeah, before the break, you were talking about consequences. And yeah I think a lot of times right now with parenting, there's like this gentle parenting movement. And I think a lot of times, like what you were saying, people get too permissive. And that's not good either, because kids do, of course, need boundaries. But then when you guys were raising kids, it was more like the authoritarian, like, "I'm the parent, you're the kid, you're gonna do what I say. I don't really care what you have to say or what you feel about it. This is just the way it is." And really, gentle parenting is supposed to be kind of in the middle. It's not authoritarian, it's authoritative. So it's clear, strong boundaries, but delivered in a kind way. And so we, I mean, we definitely have consequences for our kids, but we always try to make them logical.
So like, instead of, let's say, Otto like, smashes his Legos on the floor or something like that in like a tantrum or he's throwing them at someone or something like that, then instead of, okay, go to your room and don't come out into your calm. It's, okay, we're going to take these Legos away. These are not a choice anymore. You have to find something to do. So it's more like a direct logical consequence. Like, you mess up with this thing, you don't have to have this thing right now. But I do think that when you guys were raising us that was just kind of the norm is like You know, you take privileges away you take friends away. It's it was more punishment based.
Yeah, and I think it screwed you kids up to some degree because I mean it is one of the things that you bring up to us as You know a negative in your childhood and it you know, we can't go back and change it But of course we can only hope that in your line of work especially that you understand where that was coming from and don't you know….
I really think that most parents are like just doing their best I think I know that you guys love us obviously and that you were doing your absolute best and you always were doing what you thought was right and like luckily we all turned out well and pretty well adjusted in spite of it all.
No, we're all like in, healthy relationships and like have good jobs. And like, we're all we're all good, not to say that we don't all have issues. And like, you know, different things that we could work on or different things that stem out of our childhoods. But I think to a certain extent, everybody does. And like, my kids someday will say that I messed them up in a different way. It's just, we're all just doing our best.
I hope here to see that. Well, all of your peers were raised by our peers. So all of your contemporaries are messed up in just the same way and in the same way. So we're on a level playing field.
Exactly. That's true. Okay, before we wrap up, one thing that I try to ask everybody that comes on the podcast is... what was one thing that you wish that someone had told you before you had kids? What was something that no one told you to just like prepare for or something that really caught you off guard once you first became parents?
Oh, I know what it is.
Go ahead, you go first. No, go first.
I think, for me, aside from the sheer exhaustion of it, how it was going to affect our relationship, and how we didn't really talk about how we were going to parent before we had the baby. So I think for us, we didn't have a lot, we had grandpa at the house, so if we wanted to go out, I mean, we could leave you with grandpa, but after he had a stroke, we didn't have anybody.
Um, and I think, you know, parents, people have to realize it changes your relationship. Yeah. You know, there's no way around it. You're exhausted. It changes your, um, attention toward each other. It changes your snippiness toward each other because you're tired. And you say it all the time that it's just for a season. But when dad and I were going through it, we had never heard that phrase. And I think that that phrase allows you to think of your relationship as just, we're just in this moment. This will get better. It will, it can change. We'll come back toward each other. But back in our day, it was like, no one said that. So it was just like, it was just always a struggle to connect and find time for each other.
And it felt like it was gonna be that way forever.
And you think it's gonna be like that forever, yeah.
Yeah. What do you think, Dad?
To me, I think it's the thing that you spend so much time being anxious and worried about it before you have kids, but then as soon as you have them, like a day after you have the kid or two days after you have your first kid, it feels like that's your... life all of a sudden and there's almost no, then suddenly it's there, you've got the kid and you figure it out. And I think it just gets back to what we said at the beginning and what you said to people, which is like, don't get all anxious about it because this phenomenal thing is always going to happen and it happens to everybody, which is as soon as you have the kid, you bring the kid home, you don't know what you're doing, but you figure it out and it's okay and that's just some human phenomenon that happens to people where they don't know anything. They've got no experience with this, but somehow they figure out how to do it.
Yeah. And everything is just a phase. So even if you're in like a super hard phase, either in your relationship or in your parenting, like it really is, everything is short lived. Everything's the season, everything's a phase. Yeah. Yeah.
I think that's critical to remember because it does get stressful. It does, you know, you do have your moments where you think, I can't do this. How am I going to do this? How are we going to do this? And then, you know, you go to bed, you wake up, it's a new day, and all of a sudden you have a new perspective. And you do it all again. But somehow maybe that day will be a better day. And you hope for the better days and you take what you get when you have the bed. days and you just remember like you've said a thousand times it's just a season.
Last question. Is it true what they say about how it goes by so fast because my kids are still so tiny and your youngest is about to be 30 so is it true that it went by fast?
Totally true.
You know there's that song by Kenny Chesney something about blinkers. you know?
Yeah, don't blink.
Don't blink. That song hits it right on the head. When I look back, I think, because in our minds, we are still 25, even though we're not, we still feel like we're young kids. And then we think, oh my God, our youngest daughter is gonna get married and be 30, and I've got three grand kids like where? It's just so fast. You're and you know the thing is too is that even though you want to appreciate it…. And you want it to not take it for granted. It's just the way life is, you know. You do and before you know it you're gonna turn around to and be like, oh my god I can't believe Otto is 18 and you know, yeah in college or whatever. I mean, it just it does go by fast. It's just the way life is.
And I think it's such a mistake to like wish the time away. You know, you're like, if your goal oriented person, you're like, well, when my kid gets out of high school, then I can prepare to pay for college. Or, you know, you're always like looking ahead and almost wanting to burn off the time so you can get to the next step. And, you know, if you're paying for stuff, if you're a parent and you're paying for stuff, you're looking at it from that point of view, like how much - time do I have to save for this and you end up almost like wishing the time away.
That's true. Which I think is a huge problem and mistake and I think it's just a modern society problem which is that people can't live in the moment. Things are going by so fast and there's so much information hitting them and they're always like thinking ahead what's the next thing I want to buy or what's the next thing I want to do or next job or whatever and living in the moment is so, so important. And it's, I think it's harder to do when you're younger than it is when you're older too.
So yeah, people that are younger probably have a hard time doing that. I'm not sure if that's right, but I think it is.
I think when you're parenting young kids and it seems so intense and like everybody needs you so much and you don't ever get a moment to yourself, like I think it is easy to fall into that like, Oh my God, I can't wait till they're older, but then when they're older, you miss it. So it's, it's hard, but yeah, that's good advice to just try as as much as you can to stay present and to enjoy the moments that you can enjoy and the ones that just let them go and remember that it's a season.
Mom and Dad I'll let you guys go because you're at Natalie's house right now ready to help her with something but thank you so much for joining I think everybody's gonna really love to hear this episode. Thank you. We love seeing you. Love you. Love you too.

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